On Tuesday, New York City FC announced the hiring of Jason
Kreis as the first head coach in franchise history. He will spend the next year
at Manchester City, NYCFC’s owners, learning the “City way” and working with
Manuel Pellegrini, Patrick Vieira, and Txiki Bergiristain as well as scouting
players and preparing for the 2015 season. This announcement came on the same
day that there were a few articles written about the club getting close to
finalizing a $350 million, 28,000-person stadium close to Yankee Stadium in the
Bronx, so it was one of the franchises first red letter days.
Kreis is an 18 year veteran of MLS, having split twelve
seasons between the Dallas Burn and Real Salt Lake as a player and then coaching Real
Salt Lake for almost seven full seasons (was named head coach during the 2007 season).
He scored the first goal for both the Dallas and Salt Lake franchises, was the
first American MVP of the league, and is currently third all time in MLS
scoring with 108 goals. His career has totaled 544 games as a player and coach.
Now that we’ve got the background down, let’s move onto why
Kreis is the perfect hire for NYCFC.
First off, and most importantly, Kreis is a fantastic coach.
Real Salt Lake advanced to the playoffs in all six full seasons that he was the
coach. He won the MLS Cup in 2009, led RSL to become the first MLS team to
reach the CONCACAF Champions League finals (although they lost) in 2010/11, and
led them to finals losses in both the US Open Cup and MLS Cup this year. His
teams are incredibly disciplined in their tactics and his game plan is almost
always the right one. You don’t build a 102-77-60 (W-L-D) record at a small
market team without superior tactics and coaching. As well balanced as the
players on RSL are, I honestly don’t think they are nearly talented enough to
have finished 2nd in the Western Conference three of the last four
years.
He also has plenty of experience with brand new franchises and
building them from the ground up. He was on both the Dallas Burn and RSL for
their inaugural MLS seasons. In his seven years at RSL, he took them from
perennial bottom feeder to perennial MLS Cup contenders. His first full season
as RSL’s coach in 2008 followed three losing seasons that had a total of 21
wins. RSL saw 21 wins and two trips to the playoffs in his first two seasons as
coach. The next three seasons saw 47 wins with finishes in the top three of the
West all three years (3rd once, 2nd twice). His final
season might have been the most impressive of all than. Due to small market
restraints in Salt Lake, last years offseason was one filled with watching core
players leave for the club. Coming into the season, they were looked at as a team in rebuilding mode that wasn’t a serious threat to be contenders. RSL ended up
with a Western Conference leading 16 wins and were MLS Cup runners up. It was a
phenomenal job by Kreis and the RSL staff to have the depth of players to come
in to replace the ones that left, as well as to develop tactics and an identity
that perfectly suited the players they had. No team had the depth that RSL did
and that is such a credit to the job that Kreis and the front office did to
create a full squad, not just a good starting 11.
Another hugely important trait that Kreis carries is his
player management. NYCFC figures to be one of the largest market and money
teams in MLS, and as a former star in the league, Kreis will know how to handle
these big money players. Just look to Seattle’s finish this season and it is
obvious that putting big names and talent on the field doesn’t automatically
lead to success. The locker room has to belong to the coach, and with Kreis it
will.
Kreis is also a coach who can definitely be marketed. He is
a good looking, young American that you can put on billboards and commercials. He
is easily one of the top American coaches, with most analysts considering him
to be the top of the “next generation” along with Portland’s Caleb Porter. There are a lot of people who think he has
a good chance to be Jurgen Klinsmann’s replacement as head coach of the US
National Team, possibly to begin the 2022 World Cup cycle.
For the fans, this is a great move because it will really
calm nerves that NYCFC will just be Manchester City USA. Kreis joins Director
of football operations Claudio Reyna to form a duo at the head of the soccer
side that has deep roots in US soccer. While Man City easily could have hired a
big name European coach, they went with an American MLS veteran.
Another thing that will get the fans excited is the derby
with the New York Red Bulls. Any two teams that are so close will eventually
develop a rivalry; the fans will always want to one up the other team and
there will always be a battle for headlines. However, Kreis brings a little
something extra to the table. He and Mike Petke (coach of RBNY) famously fought
on the field back in their playing days, and their lone game against each other
as coaches was a fantastic one which ended in a 4-3 Red Bulls victory. This storyline
will bring even more sizzle to the New York derby come 2015.
For Kreis this is a great move for a couple reasons. The
first is that he will no longer be handicapped by a small market. He had great
success with limited resources at Real Salt Lake, and now he will have almost
unlimited resources with the uber rich Manchester City as the club’s primary
backer. It will be incredibly interesting to see what he can do with the
ability to spend to the salary cap’s limit and bring in three
It is also a perfect step for him on his coaching journey.
Nobody thinks that NYCFC, or even MLS, will be the final stop in his coaching
career. It is the perfect club to be at to audition for a potential future as
USMNT head coach or, if he prefers, a jump to Europe. He will spend the next
year at Manchester City working with the coaching staff there and forming
relationships that could land him a future job.
The timing of the move is also great for the fans, club, and
Kreis. It gives Kreis and Reyna a year to figure out exactly what they want.
They can develop the plan for the type of team and system they want, scout
hundreds of players to find the best fits in their system and set up a youth program. Caleb Porter got a
three month head start in Portland last year and took them from one of the
worst teams to one of the best teams. Kreis has a full year before NYC’s first
offseason to do the same.
Bottom line: NYCFC is absolutely starting out on the right
foot.
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